Heard on the Street: Financial District Rents Down 25 Percent From 2009

Posted on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 8:20pm

The Financial District is the oldest neighborhood in Manhattan, and home to some of the most beautiful buildings in New York City, but it's still in its infancy as a residential neighborhood. When the first luxury rentals in the Financial District opened their doors, they offered walk-to-work opportunities and... well, not much else. Since then, though, the Financial District has really come into its own. It's a 24-hour neighborhood now, with good restaurants and a nascent nightlife scene and grocery stores and everything else NYC dwellers expect from, like, a neighborhood. All of which is to say that there's a reason why there are so many rental listings in the Financial District -- it's a nice place to live, near a ton of mass transit, you can walk to work, and all the other good stuff we wrote above.

But just as Wall Street has had a rough couple of years, the Financial District rental apartment market has, too. There are still a number of terrific apartments for rent in the Financial District, of course -- 71 Broadway and The Crest, for instance. What has changed, the New York Post reports, is that Financial District rental apartments are now cheaper than ever, with rental prices down almost 25 percent over the last year. In short, if you've ever been interested in a luxury rental apartment in the Financial District, this would be the time to look.